A Thousand Lives Over
by Emma L. Wright
Summary: The originals have been around for a thousand years, and all the memories and stories have built up over the past millennia. And they all come rushing back to the surface when an old friend comes back to Mystic Falls to check up on the remaining Mikaelsons.
1. Chapter 1

_**Every time I've seen an episode of the Vampire Diaries I've always been far more interested in the back stories of the originals than the whole Damon-Elena-Stefan issues. So, I decided I'd sate my own interests. Enjoy and let me know what you think!**_

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Prologue: She Had to Be Dead

He couldn't believe it. He simply couldn't believe it. She was dead. She had to have been. No one had heard a peep out of her in nearly half a century, and she wasn't one to stay quiet being a bit of a celebrity in the supernatural world. After all, a bloodhound was like the vampire to any regular human mortal. She was his myth, and she was sitting across the room at the bar.

"Elijah!" she called excitedly across the room, waving her hand for him to come over. He did so, as though in a dream. She had to be dead . . . didn't she? But every sign allowed to him said otherwise. There she was. Same windswept, dark blonde hair and eyes that resembled the ocean - placid as a lake one moment, a roaring tempest the next - same tanned skin, short stature, and that feeling you got from her - I'm happy to be alive, you should be, too.

"Evera?" Elijah managed to choke out as he robotically pulled out one of the stools next to her and sat down.

"No, I'm Oprah. Yes, Evera, idiota! Que vamos a hacer contigo? What on earth are we going to do with you?"

"Ah, how, are you alive?" Elijah asked, not even listening to what his companion was saying.

"What do you mean?" Evera asked in apparent confusion. "I never died, man. Where have you been?"

"But, no word in nearly fifty years. Woodstock was the last anyone heard of you. What happened?"

"Oh that," she said, waving it away as though it were some bothersome fly while taking a sip of her beer. "I got a little hungry after getting drunk, and we'll just leave at that. But all's well that ends well, I'm here now."

"So you've what - just been laying low after that little incident at Woodstock?" Elijah asked in disbelief seeing as that wasn't Evera at all.

"No, it was just my wake up call. I was getting stupider, if that's even a word -"

"It is not," he interrupted the girl.

"Fine then, more stupid and daring each time. I needed a little rehab time to get off the fix, so I took a decade off, then another, and now I guess it's been near on fifty years. Hmm."

"What?" the original asked, waving away the bartender who had come to take his order.

The girl's face was fixed with a slight frown as her brow furrowed. "I just never thought I'd take to retirement. At least I haven't done golf yet. At that point I'd know I was completely off the reservation." Her frown immediately turned into a glowing smile and a chuckle escaped her throat at her joke.

Elijah couldn't help but laugh as well. "You would never have the patience for golf anyway."

"Cela est vrai. That is very true," she mused. "Enough about me since now you know I'm very much alive, just having a . . . indefinite leave of absence for now. How's your life? Spill. I've got this feeling that I've missed out on quite a lot."

"Evera you know exactly what I've been up to since the moment you left when . . ." Elijah trailed off, not wanting to finish.

But the young girl waved this remark away as well. "That is besides the point Elijah. I want to hear it all from you."

"Where do you want me to start?"

"Perhaps the best place to start is when you finally went home."

"You mean Mystic Falls."

"Like I said, home."


	2. Chapter 2

_**Here's the first full chapter. Not as long as I'd like, but we can't have our cake and eat it, too. Couldn't believe the amount of hits and alerts I was getting for a less than thousand word prologue. Thanks for the support! Hope you enjoy the chapter! Also, if there's any time period or a particular story you would like to have me write about (in relevance to the Originals and Evera) shoot me a review or pm me or whatever. I have enough material to get through the first few chapters, but this is more of a as I go story - totally unplanned which mean the possibilities are endless!**_

**_Disclaimer:_**

Chapter 1: Just Like Old Times

"So let me get this straight," Evera said once more. "There's another doppleganger, and as always there's loads of drama around her that you got into, you finally found out a way to kill your brother, but he ended up daggering you because you made a deal with him that had something to do with your family. Oh, and he's now some freakazoid hybrid since he managed to break the curse in the middle of all that."

"In a nutshell, yes," Elijah agreed taking a sip of his drink and smiling inwardly at the unfailing ability Evera had always seem to possess of making just about anyone sound like they were incredibly stupid and naive. "Then - "

"Yes, we've been over this part, too," Evera said annoyed. "More drama happened while you were daggered including the resurrection of your sister and the real death (not the flimsy dagger kind) of your father. Some dude named Damon undaggered you so you would try to help dagger your dear brother, but apparently you never really got around to it. Dear mummy original popped up along the way complete with original siblings which Mummy tried to kill just when you all were becoming a family again. However, that was all stopped and now you all split up (well, Finn's dead) and you're here, having a drink with me. Oh, and you finally got the right haircut."

Elijah gave a very undignified snort at her last comment knowing full well her opinions on both his and Niklaus' hair. He suspected she would finally approve of his as well.

The two clinked their bottles together in a little toast when Elijah suddenly had a thought. "Did you plan on meeting me here, tonight, Evera Naughtori? Or was it mere coincidence?"

Evera just smiled a sly smile and took another drink. "Oh come now, Elijah, however would I manage that?"

"Yes, well, I'm still trying to figure out Prague at the Charles Bridge."

Evera laughed gleefully. "Really? Well, I guess you'll just have to add Boston to that list of uncertainties."

The corners of his mouth twitched upwards. Evera was just as inclined to theatrics and the whole smoke and mirrors idea as much a Klaus. The main difference between the two was Evera's flexibility when others betrayed her. The bloodhound was willing to see more than one way to deal with them where as Klaus generally killed whoever on the spot that had dared upset him.

"Oh, if history's any inclination then you planned our meeting tonight which meant you haven't taken to retirement as well as you think. Besides," Elijah added, "I'm fairly close to figuring out how you managed Prague."

Evera practically snorted into her drink. "Well, you let me know when you have, alright? Now, you're partially right. There is far to much going on for me to just sit still. Surely you know me well enough to know that!"

Elijah nodded. He did know her quite well. Evera had, after all, worked for Klaus and himself for a good nine centuries. "So do you have any plans for all this excitement?" he questioned, knowing full well she did.

In response she merely shrugged and cocked her head to the side, as always reminding Elijah of a mischievous puppy - not that that was ver far off a resemblance.

He just shook his head, torn between interrogating her further about why she had decided to come back out of the woodwork now and what her plans were for the future. After a few moments deliberation he compromised.

"So what have you been up to during your five decade vacation? Besides not golfing, that is."

Evera cracked a smile. "Oh, this and that. Did a world sweep for seven, eight years. Just going wherever the wind took me, you know. Then I managed to pull one of those nostalgic trips. God, that was awful two years."

"Nostalgic trip?" Elijah asked, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah," she said taking another sip of her drink. "You know, where you get so caught up in the past that, depending on how many years you have on your belt, you can pass an entire year, sometimes two, just in your memories. I was practically comatose by the end of that. Like I said, awful." She shuddered for added effect.

Elijah shook his head again. He had heard of this happening to vampires, or any immortal creature for that matter, especially those who had a more . . . haunting past. He had never managed to keep up the flashbacks for more than a few days, though.

"I'm sure it was," he consoled his old friend, thinking back to the very beginning. Evera had come to be with his brother and himself after they had practically eradicated her entire village that had only been across river from where his family had lived in the New World. Though, there had been about fifty years of difference between his becoming a vampire and the discovery of Evera Naughtori.

Nine hundred years of what she had been through would probably warrant a nostalgic trip.

The two continued talking and drinking until the bar closed at four in the morning. Then they headed to a diner that opened early and sat and had breakfast together. Just like old times. Only it hadn't usually been just him and Evera. Niklaus usually had sat next to the young (by her kind's standards) bloodhound.

"Oh, oh, oh," Evera said with excitement. "I completely forget with all the catching up and seeing you again in what feels like forever."

"Forgot what?" Elijah asked with polite interest, taking a bite of his pancakes, thinking whether or not to have a blood bag after he finished his breakfast.

"The entire reason I tracked you down!"

"Oh, so you did know I would be here," he said with a smile, catching his friend's mistake.

She just rolled here eyes and declared that they both knew coincidence was just a silly word to help people cope with inexplicable occurrences, so it should have been completely obvious that she had shown up knowing full well that he'd be there.

"What was it you wanted to tell me?" the older man asked, interrupting her rant.

"Oh, yes, well, Blood Moon's almost here. And guess how many of those I'll have lived through!" Evera said excitedly.

Elijah chuckled inwardly. Back in his time birthdays weren't really recorded or kept track of. Evera had always had a fascination with hers, though, as she was born on the Hunter's Moon, or Blood Moon. So, even though it fell on different days throughout the year, each time a Blood Moon came around (generally in late October) she would celebrate her birthday.

"How many?" Elijah asked, but he was fairly certain he knew.

"No," Evera admonished. "Guess."

Elijah made a show of trying to figure it out before giving her a number he knew not to be true. "Nine hundred and . . . forty-two."

Evera just gave him a playful glare. "Come on, know exactly how old I'll be next week."

"Yes," Elijah said smiling. "One thousand to be precise. No longer a little pup."

A grin broke across her face. "Finally. Took long enough, don't you think?"

"Yes, it most certainly did."

"You know," she began, leaning back against her side of the booth they were occupying, "I remember my first blood moon."

Elijah scoffed, setting his coffee down. "You're good, Evera, but you're not that good."

"Okay, maybe I should have said I remember stories told of my first blood moon."

"That sounds more likely."

"Apparently the moon's color was actual red when I was born, right in the middle of it. It was the night the bloodhound's of our village fought the Frayers, a rival clan, and won a bloody battle."

Elijah took the news without a word, mulling it over in his head. This was new information. Actually, just about anything Evera shared about her life in her village would have been new information. She wasn't the sharing type.

"Is that so?" was all he commented.

She shrugged, attacking her bacon. "Well, as you so flippantly pointed out, I couldn't really tell you. I was dealing with the whole I was just born thing."

Elijah laughed softly then went back to his meal.

The two sat in comfortable silence for awhile before Evera broke it. "Do you remember?"

"Remember what?" Elijah asked passively, finishing up his pancakes and coffee.

"When you were a little boy and human."

He stopped eating and composed himself before answering. "You know all our stories. Niklaus and I's both."

"No I don't," she retorted. "I only know what very little you two decided to tell me and what I managed to scrape out of Clara and Ayanna."

"You have spoken to Ayanna?" Elijah asked, incredulous.

"Of course," Evera said as though he should have known. "She's the one that made my moonstone amulet," she explained, her hand flying to her throat an fiddling with a blue stone set in an iron circle covered in ruins and symbols. A chain of both rope and some coppery substance were twined together and clasped at the back of her neck.

It looked like a piece of costume jewelry that anyone might where today, Elijah thought ironically. However, this was no trinket. It was one of a bloodhound's few links to humanity or even being human - a priceless object.

"Did she? You never said," Elijah said.

"I must have."

"I don't believe so. Did you know her well?"

"No, it was my father that knew her. I only met with her on a handful of times and then briefly."

Elijah nodded in understanding and waved the half-awake waitress over signaling they were ready for the bill.

"What was Ayanna really like? She was always mysterious and aloof when I was around." Evera asked curiously.

Elijah opened his mouth to answer as he paid the check and left a sizable tip on the table when Evera interrupted.

"You know what. Screw that tell me the whole story."

"What story?" Elijah asked confused as he stood and pulled his jacket on.

"Your story. Niklaus' story. I know you two don't like talking about when you were human, but I think, seeing as we've all been together for near on a thousand years some answers are owed."

Elijah sighed, wondering if he could get out of giving Evera the gruesome details of his early years.

"Besides. It's my birthday next week after all. It'd be a nice present."

He had to hand it to her. She was an expert in guilting people, but then again, he hadn't been around for more than a thousand years for nothing.

"Alright," he agreed. Sitting back down and waving for the waitress to come back over. "I'll tell you all the details Niklaus and I left out if you tell me of your younger years. Before you came to work for us. Deal?"

Evera looked like she was having an internal battle, and Elijah knew exactly what she was thinking. On one hand the girl really wanted to know about the brothers' pasts, but she didn't really want to divulge her own. Niklaus and he had accepted that a long time ago. If they never needed to know it didn't matter to them, and Evera had made sure that they never needed to know.

Finally she came to a conclusion. "Fine, but it might take awhile between the two of us. And your not leaving this diner until I know the whole deal."

Elijah nodded his consent as the waitress practically slept-walked over. "Can I," a great big yawn separated the sentence, "get you all anything else? I thought you already paid."

"Our apologies," Elijah began, being his usual formal, polite self. "We did, but we were wondering if we could stay awhile longer? I, of course, would order more of your delicious coffee."

The waitress just nodded, jotting the order down and turned towards the girl. "Anything more for you?"

"Do you have beer?" she asked, not at all ashamed.

The waitress raised her brow. "You are aware it's not even five in the morning."

"Any type of alcohol then."

The waitress just muttered under her breath as she went to retrieve their beverages.

"Really?" Elijah asked.

"What?" Evera asked in response. "I am going to need something to help along this story, and it ain't gonna be orange juice."


	3. Chapter 3

_**Sorry I'm a little late this week. Wasn't near a computer most of the weekend. Anyway, here's the newest post to date! I'm a little skeptical on how I wrote this considering my plan was to do it all in one chapter and this is looking more like a two parter. Little worried about the quality as well, I just wasn't as into this chapter but then again it was more background than anything. Well, I'll let you start reading Elijah begins his tale of woe and we learn a few little tidbits about Evera as well! Enjoy!**_

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_**Chapter 2: The Origin of the Originals - Part 1**_

"You first," Evera decided once the two were situated with their drinks (coffee for Elijah and the waitress had actually scrounged up a beer for Evera).

"Who says?" Elijah teased, taking a sip of the coffee.

"Uh, me. It's my birthday after all."

Elijah laughed at the silly antics of what he had come to think of as a younger sister. Rebekah might be his blood, but Evera had always gotten him in a way no one else did, even if they were so different.

"Well, you know how we became vampires and apparently about Ayanna, so what's left?"

"Seriously?" Evera asked incredulously.

"What?"

"I know Mommy Witch did a spell that was supposed to make you stronger than werewolves and it turned you into vampires. Now you're telling me that's it? That's the end of the story. Come on, Elijah. That doesn't even explain the whole feud you kiddos have with Papa Original, or how Mommy Witch died. Then there's the whole your brother's part werewolf thing. Plus there was a good century before you and Niklaus picked me up. All I really know about that time is that you two had traveled a lot and left Rebekah somewhere along the way. Details, Elijah, details!" she finished dramatically.

"Alright, alright," he said in an attempt to calm the girl down. "I guess it's best to start at the beginning then."

"Which was when?"

Elijah gave her a pointed look.

"Got it, shutting up now and letting you tell your story."

"My family, as you know, were Vikings. Many of my people had left what's now the northern part of Europe and were trying their luck elsewhere in the early 1000s AD. After a plague swept over my parents homeland to which they lost their first child - a very young girl whom they named Freya - they didn't wish the same thing to happen to their family again. So my father and my mother went on one of those famous expeditions and ended up in Newfoundland. By this time, Finn and I had been born."

"But Finn's older, right?" Evera asked.

"Yes, by only a year, though."

At that response, Evera's eyebrows drew together and her lips formed a thin line.

"What? I haven't even gotten to the story yet and you already look like I've confused you," he joked.

"No, you haven't confused me. I - I just can't believe he's older. I mean it was always you who was the one in charge. Well, Niklaus might have had the reins, but he'd always ask for your advice first. Same with all the others. And," she added after a moment, "it's weird to think that I'll never meet Finn."

"But you did meet him," Elijah argued. "1893. Or was it 1894? Either way we were all in Paris, France for a while and Finn came and saw some show or another with us."

Evera snorted into her beer. "Niklaus and Finn making death threats for a good hour and a half isn't exactly my definition of knowing someone."

"Perhaps you're right. Well, like I said, Finn and I had been born by the time my parents had made it to Newfoundland. From there they decided to travel southward."

"Why?" she inquired, waving the waitress back over.

"Yes?" the waitress asked. Although she was more awake by this point her mood had only worsened. "Do you want me to just bring you the bottle of bourbon our cook keeps in his locker?"

Completely unfazed Evera answered. "No, that's fine. But could I get some eggs. Nothing special just scrabbled, sausage, and some hash browns?"

"I guess," the waitress muttered, scribbling away on her notepad. "Anything for you?" she asked, turning towards Elijah. "No thanks, just a refill."

"So, why'd you guys keep moving?" Evera asked after the waitress had again left them.

"I think," he began speaking rather slowly, "that they just hadn't found their new home. I know Father was never happy and that made Mother and the rest of us that way, too."

"You mean Papa Original pissed off one to many people so you had to get the heck out of dodge because it would have killed him to be a little humble and play nice."

"Like I said, he didn't feel like he'd found the place he wanted to stay," Elijah repeated with a wry smile. Evera's ability to always cut through all the nonsense and get to the truth had always amused and amazed him.

"Mmm hmm. But obviously you all moved again and ended up in Mystic Falls?"

"Yes, we did. About three years past and we traveled as far south as the Mystic Falls area and ended up moving into the village here. It was a bunch of local natives, werewolves, no other foreigners except for my family."

"And the rest of the original family was born here, right? Niklaus, Kol, Rebekah, and Henrik?"

"Yes, I remember when each was born and my parents named them our neighbors thought it so strange. They had never heard our tongue before and it took us awhile to get used to theirs."

"But Niklaus' father wasn't Mikael, right? That's were the whole I'm a hybrid hear me roar thing came from?"

"Yes, I was still so young I don't remember anything that could point out who his real father was. Even if I had been, my mother kept it hidden well. No one knew anything about her affair until after the son had made his first kill."

"I just couldn't believe that. I mean Helena and Jerome knew every time."

"And Helena and Jerome are?"

"My parents."

"Every time? As in both your parents had multiple affairs?"

"They didn't like each other much. I'll tell you all about it once you finish your story first."

Elijah just raised his eyebrows in response but went back to his story. "It was all very peaceful for fifteen years or so. Father didn't exactly get along with everybody but the rest of the men in the village were generally hot tempered anyhow."

"So it worked out?"

"Yes, it worked out," he chuckled.

They were interrupted by the waitress bringing them their breakfast.

"Eggs scrambled, sausage, and some browns for the seriously early in the day-drinker and coffee for her somewhat more sane companion," she said, laying down their orders on the table. "Can I get you anything else?"

"A vein would be lovely," Evera muttered under her breath so low only Elijah could hear.

"Nothing," he told her, giving the girl across from him a look.

"What?" she asked.

"Still doing human?" he asked, not answering her question.

"Easier to get in a pinch than vampire or werewolf, and definitely my own kind," she shrugged.

"Hmm," Elijah mused.

"Well?"

"Well what?" he asked, coming out of his reverie.

"So you guys have all settled into Mystic Falls and happy days are here again. What happened? And if your dad didn't know about Niklaus then why do they hate each other now?"

Elijah just shook his head. "I really don't know why they hated each other before they found out they weren't really related. They weren't opposite personalities really. Both of them had tempers and were headstrong so that didn't help when they got into fights. Niklaus could be a little reckless sometimes but he wasn't as bad as Kol, and Father never fought with him the way he did with Klaus. Maybe Father suspected my brother's true parentage. I really have nothing but conjecture on that subject."

"Well you're completely useless," Evera told him, feigning annoyance.

The corners of her companion's lips quirked up before he resumed speaking. "As I was saying, everything went well for awhile even with Father and Niklaus at each other's throats. Mother was happy learning more of her craft from Ayanna and they were even teaching Rebekah some. My brothers and I had fun with the rest of the village boys and helped our fathers hunt and such. It wasn't easy, but we were the most happy we would ever be then. That is until we met Tatia. And it all went downhill from there."

Previously Evera had been half-listening attentively to Elijah while eating her breakfast, but at this development she perked up and looked Elijah directly in the eyes. "Now this one I haven't heard."

"With good reason," Elijah explained. "You know her doppleganger was the key to breaking Niklaus' curse?"

"Yeah," she muttered sarcastically. "I remember a little to well."

"Did you ever learn why?"

She shrugged. "Figured it had something to do with the original of the dopplegangers. Guess I was right."

"You were. It was her blood my siblings and I consumed on the night we became vampires and it was with her death Mother made Niklaus' werewolf part dormant."

"Really? But why her?"

"She was a . . . what was that term you used to describe Katerina back when she was human?"

"An attention seeking, confused, obviously fake English accented, little girl?"

"No, you also used it to refer to that Gretchen girl Tomis knew back in the 1300s."

"Oh, you mean a home-wrecker?"

"Yes. Well, Tatia could pretty well be described as a home-wrecker. She had an illegitimate child when she couldn't have been older than 17 or 18 but never married the man. In fact, he was killed not a year or so after his child's birth. When the acceptable mourning period was over, all the young, eligible men of the village began to try to court her. Niklaus and I both tried to win her over-"

"Not Kol or Finn?" Evera interrupted.

"No, Finn had no interest in her; Kol was still a little young. But she did seem to always like Niklaus and I best, always showing us her favor and somehow managing to keep both of us relatively equal. This went on for almost a year and we both fell deeply in love with the girl. Both of us thought we were the one for her and would often fight each other oftentimes coming to blows about it."

"Ah, women, we will always be the fault of man," Evera mused, pushing back her now empty plate and leaning back in her booth.

Elijah snorted and took a sip of his coffee. "An unfortunate truth as was evident with Niklaus, Tatia, and myself."

"So is this the point where Mommy Witch takes and locks her away in a tower?"

"No, not quite. I told you my brother and I's affair with Tatia went on for almost a year?"

"Yeah."

"Well a lot can happen in a year."

"Like what?"

Elijah just frowned into his coffee cup staring at the dark brown liquid. "Nothing good."

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**_So what did you think? Good, bad, ugly? Please tell me it wasn't ugly. Well, let me know and review! Oh, and if you have any particular time period or event you would like me to specifically include let me know as well. Thanks._**


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